The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent the work is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Traditional network-based computer architectures generally involve multiple traditional personal computers, each of which comprises its own computing system components such as a central processing unit, memory, etc., each of which is connected to a centralized server or servers. Management of resources in such architectures, however, has become increasingly complex as the size of networks continues to grow. In addition to the physical logistics of such a network, problems such as asset management, support costs, troubleshooting, etc., all make such an architecture potentially unworkable. Further, in many cases, network users do not need the resources or computing power offered by a personal computer, and therefore these expensive resources are underutilized in such architectures.
To combat the inefficiencies of traditional network-based computer architectures making extensive use of personal computers, many network-based architectures have transitioned to a server-based computing models, such as thin client or zero client. Typically, a zero client or thin client is heavily dependent on another computer system or server, which generally fulfills the computational rolls for the zero client or ultrathin client. In such cases, the zero client is simply a low-end computer terminal, which includes peripherals such as a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, that also provides a graphical user interface (GUI) to the user. In such configurations, a central computer system or server hosts the operating systems and software applications utilized by the thin client or zero client.
Generally, a system user utilizes the thin or zero client's local GUI to provide credentials that allow the user to access a desktop operating system that is hosted within a virtual machine running on the centralized server. Once the user provides the credentials to access the virtualized desktop, those resources are displayed on the user's monitor, and the resources for providing the local GUI are terminated. When the user finishes with the virtualized desktop, however, the entire thin client or zero client must be powered down and restarted to reboot the local GUI, which results in wasted time and system resources.
Therefore, an unaddressed need exists in the art to address the aforementioned deficiencies and inadequacies.